Alongside Humphrey Street was the wall that segregated the hospital and the community and on the hospital side of the wall there was a small laneway called “Flinders Street” by the late June Purkiss who worked at the hospital from the 1940’s. It was so busy with foot and cart traffic that it was said to resemble that busy CBD Melbourne street.

All this area has now been demolished including the rear of the Barracks building. This was to make way for new wards in the early 1960’s. The front of the Barracks on the photo below shows the hole and driveway that was created for trucks to remove the building rubble. The rubble was used for widening the local roads in the Derwent Valley, filling in an area on the Esplanade and also as fill up against the hospital wall so the new ward for the Criminally Insane could be built on top.

The other old photo above is the original wall and gates that led up the driveway that faces the front of the Barracks. There has always been debate as to where the original gate disappeared to, some say that a politician has them on the front of his country property still. This has never been proved though.

B Ward (above) was also demolished in the early 1960’s but its foundations can still be see in the Geophysical mapping that was done by Flinders University. The red lined square shape is the current C Ward yard which contains part of B Ward or Male Refractory and part of A Ward later referred to as the Gentleman’s Cottage”.

One of the most recognisable buildings on the site was K1 and K2 wards (below) and the large central clock tower. When this was also demolished in the early 1960’s one resident from Humphrey Street stated she could now see the sun in the morning for the first time since she live there in the shadow of the tower. Many were sad to see this iconic structure demolished, but a hospital that needed to progress was the order of the day and new buildings were going to occupy the site soon.

As a bit of fun we have been going through some photos of the often lost things on the Heritage site. They can be lost because there is simply so much to take in and these things are over looked but they played an important part at the site.

The first picture I put up on the Willow Court History Group’s Facebook group was of a red button. We had a number of people attempt to answer where they thought it was and what it was used for.

It is always good to have ex staff on the Facebook site as they not only know the answers to these questions, they can often add details that had not been known either to me or in records that help us all know what went on behind the walls.

“Matty Graham: That’s an alarm button in the office on the floor in A ward.”

The answer was 100% correct but Matty went on to inform us that C Ward and the Admin Building also had similar foot operated panic alarms.

We also had Carla who had insight into A Ward and stated;

“This button came in handy when the men escaped from C ward and came to get their girlfriends out in A ward.”

She is referring to one of the most recent and well known escapes from the secure hospital Wards. This is when male patients broke out of C Ward and entered A Ward “to get their girlfriends out”.

The other side of this was from a residents view. If you lived in the town of New Norfolk there were different reactions, Paul Mayne remembers growing up and stated; 

“When i was a kid and the alarm went off and we were seen on the streets .. you got to feel the wooden spoon across your ass !!!”

So one photo and we have enjoyed three different perspectives and learnt some new stuff along the way. Thanks guys for participating.

Here is what the Book Troubled Asylum stated about the siren when it was sounded.

“The Lachlan Park Hospital will sound a siren when a patient is considered dangerous escapes” The medical administrator of the hospital (Dr J.R.C. Weatherly) said yesterday the alarm would be three ten-second blasts at five-second intervals. If the patient were recaptured within five hours of the alarm being given. an “all clear”, one thirty second blast would be sounded. Dr Weatherly said the siren would be tested each Friday at noon. The test would be a single 15-second blast. (Troubled Asylum)

Cheers Mark Krause